11 / 20
4
A NEW MILLENNIUM
B
the early 2000s, several more versions of CORE
had been released, and Vitech had served as
a systems engineering consultant and mentor for
numerous companies and government agencies. But
several team members were chafing at the growing
Washington, D.C.-area congestion, so Vitech began
to look for a second location within driving distance
of the capital.
Virginia Tech’s Corporate Research Center—
dedicated to developing high-tech companies,
adjacent to Long’s alma mater, and a half-day’s drive
to DC—fit the bill. Vitech opened a satellite office at
the park in 2003. At that time, the two offices were
operated as sister units. The Blacksburg office in
southwest Virginia became the primary location for
software development and the back-office team, and
the Northern Virginia office remained the home for
sales and professional services given its proximity to
DC.
It was during this time that Vitech landed a
contract as part of the U.S. government’s Future
Combat Systems, or FCS, effort. FCS, a venture to
revamp and revision the infantry based on modern
technology, was one of the biggest undertakings of
the army since World War II. While this massive
effort is generally regarded as unsuccessful, there
were pockets of brilliance.
United Defense Limited Partnership (UDLP), now
part of BAE Systems, was a big player in this effort;
their contribution was to be a redesign of their
classic infantry carrier vehicle, the Bradley. In the
newly conceived version, the infantry carrier vehicle
was to have a sensor feeding real-time data back
to a command post. One of the project’s systems
engineering managers came to a Vitech training
class taught by Jim Long. At the end of the four-day
course, David Long recalled, “He said, ‘This is great!
Where could I find myself some engineers who
could do this?’”
Jim said, “You’re looking at them.”
So it came to be that UDLP engaged Vitech—both
the CORE software and engineers—to develop the
project. With UDLP’s expertise and Vitech support,
the team was able to create a robust systems design.
Jackie McGettigan, a senior systems engineer at
Vitech, became the owner of all systems interfaces.
David Long recalled the weekly status-check
meetings that McGettigan would attend. “At each of
these meetings, the team lead would ask a question
that no one could answer,” Long said. “There’d be a
15-second pause. Someone would say, ‘We’ll get that
answer for you tomorrow. But Jackie would pipe up
with the answer—crisp and correct.”
McGettigan had all the fundamental architecture
modeled in CORE, and with the software doing
its job of providing a single source of truth, she
had ready access to the needed information. “She
didn’t have to go ask a team or flip through a ton of
documents. She just checked the model, and it was
right there.” The outcome was that the customer
had the information they needed when they needed
it, and could move forward without a day’s delay.
In 2005, the company began developing
GENESYS™, its next generation systems
10